Hopes of Paris

Chapter V: Fiery One

The sky was turning gray, and the weather suddenly felt slightly but bizarrely foggy. Sam and Sall weren't even close enough to catching up with the girl. She resembled Carmen a lot as a child, so much that it was almost impossible for her to exist. She pedaled way too fast for the two men. It was hard for them to catch up because of the fact that their weight is slowing them down, in contrast to how small and swift the girl is. She took a turn a couple of hundreds of metres later into a narrow alley, which forced Sam to stop the bike.

Sall quickly took off behind her on his feet and ran through the alley between a couple of buildings. At the end, she took a turn right. Sall followed fast but just when he reached the intersection, he heard noises coming from the left side. There was a lot of cries and laughter all at the same time. He looked to the right side and watched the girl leave back to the streets, then to the source of noise and decided it'd be impossible to catch up to the girl. Sall clenched on his teeth and fists, then decided to investigate why and where all this noise is coming from.

He walked slowly through the small alley, looking around anxiously. It was filled with trash and empty boxes laying on the floor. Sall's fear of tight places only contributed in making him even more anxious. From the distance, a couple of shadows begin appearing. They were laughing, and kicking something or someone behind a big trash dump. Sall squinted his eyes and walked closer silently. As he got closer, it turned out two children were kicking and beating a homeless kid up. His eyes widened at the sight and he turned his speed up to run again and grabbed the two children by their shirts' collars. Sall lifted them off the floor, and they were finally alerted to the existence of someone else as they struggled to leave Sall's grab.

"Leave him alone!" He threw both of the children simultaneously at the wall behind him, and they fell on their behinds in pain.

"Ack..." One of them yelled out in pain as his back hit the wall.

"Shoot... Run, run!" The other guy quickly stood up and started running away. His friend followed soon after.

Sall stood there and watched them run out from the part of the intersection where the girl had left from. His expressions were filled with nothing but pure anger; his eyebrows in an intense frown and his eyes lit up with a glimmer of madness. He then turned around towards the kid who laid on the floor. His clothes were torn up and blood covered the top part of his head, his nose and all around his mouth. The kid was curled up in a ball and hid his face and eyes with both hands, crying audibly.

"Are you okay?" Sall walked close and kneeled down on the floor, reaching a hand. "Can you stand up?"

"Don't hurt me," the little kid slapped Sall's hand away as he cried in utter sorrow and pain. "Go away!"

The little child quickly stood up and ran off from the part of the intersection where Sall came from. The moment he was taking a turn, Sam too was coming in to check up on what's going on. The little kid pushed Sam away slightly and continued running. Confused, Sam gazed towards the child and walked faster to stand by Sall's side. He kept looking around him as if he's looking for the girl, wondering if Sall caught up with her yet or not. He brushed the dust he got on his clothes because of the child away and looked behind him one last time.

"I came here because I heard you yell. Is everything okay?" Sam asked, turning his eyes back towards Sall.

What fell ahead of Sam's gaze was a terrifying sight. Sall was still there, kneeling down on the floor infront of a small puddle of blood. Sall looked absolutely broken. His hands clenched furiously to his head and his fingers wrapped around the strands of his hair. Sall's eyes were open wide in what looked like a terrorized look. Tears were also silently falling from them as his gaze focused on one point of the floor, and he never twitched or moved once. He was thinking of how familiar this sight was; he had gone through this multiple times as a kid himself. Sam quickly rushed towards Sall and started rubbing his shoulders. It's been a while since the last time Sam saw his friend that way.